從美東時間10月16日晚開始，加拿大全境娛樂用大麻正式合法。加拿大聯邦政府只出臺了少數基礎規定，由各省自行制定具體規則。這和鄰國美國的做法截然不同。在美國很多州，要么規定從醫用到娛樂用大麻通通違法，要么直接認定為合法，而聯邦政府卻對大麻使用不管不問。

美國政府視而不見產生了一些不良后果。在加拿大設定大麻合法化以前，烏拉圭一直是全球唯一認定成人娛樂用大麻價值鏈合法的國家。雖然該國使用美元，合法的大麻賣家卻無法使用受美國監管的金融系統，比如美國的銀行或者大型信用卡網絡，因為美國法律禁止機構處理毒品“贓款”。即便跟科羅拉多州、加州和華盛頓州等大麻合法州的企業做生意，烏拉圭的商家也只能用現金交易，給交易雙方都帶來風險。

加拿大的企業不會受到合法性限制，但也許會遭遇烏拉圭面臨的另一個問題：合法的大麻供應有限。加拿大已大量種植大麻，有些供應醫用的合法用途，有些非法用途的流入黑市。如果要開辟新的合法娛樂用大麻市場，加拿大聯邦政府就要給更多的工業化種植大麻業主頒發牌照，自用最多只能種植4株大麻。可食用大麻的規定還要一年以后才能落地。

加拿大滑鐵盧大學經濟學家安因達·森向舊金山媒體《圣荷西水星報》表示：“這就像是把五條道的公路并入一條道的國家公路。很難把方方面面及時理順。”而且，加拿大與美國的關系也給大麻行業帶來負面影響：如果前往美國的加拿大人承認剛抽過大麻，或者為了大麻生意而出差，美國的邊境官可能會阻止他們入境。

不過，多年來一些跨國企業和投資基金一直在大麻市場外徘徊，等待合法投資大規模工業化種植和經銷大麻的時機。多家醫用大麻生產商也已在加拿大的股市上市。

在全球其他地方，今年早些時候格魯吉亞與南非的高等法院都做出判決，裁定個人使用大麻合法，并未承認銷售大麻合法。至少還有十幾個國家出臺了非正式政策，放松大麻相關法規的執法力度，但尚未正式批準合法生產和出售大麻。（財富中文網）

譯者：Pessy

審校：夏林

Canada legalized the sale of marijuana for recreational use starting on October 16 night. The federal government set a few baseline rules and left others to the provinces. That differs from the U.S., where many states have decriminalized or outright legalized use of marijuana ranging from medical to recreational while the U.S. federal government has turned a blind eye to the whole affair

But turning a blind eye turns out to have consequences, too. Until yesterday Uruguay was the only country to have legalized the entire value chain for adult recreational use of marijuana. But because the country uses U.S. dollars, its legal marijuana sellers cannot tap into U.S.-regulated financial systems such as U.S. banks or the major credit card networks, which are forbidden from handling drug money. Like marijuana businesses in Colorado, California, and Washington state, the Uruguayan sellers have had to resort to cash, with all its attendant risks.

Businesses in Canada will not have that problem. But they may run into another problem Uruguay encountered: limited legal supply. Canada grows a lot of marijuana already, legally for medical purposes and illegally for the black market. The federal government will have to license more industrial growers to grow its new legal recreational market. Individuals can only grow up to four plants for their own use. Rules for edibles are also still a year away.

“It’s like trying to merge a five-lane highway into a one-lane country road. It’s tough to get everything through the bottleneck on a timely basis,” University of Waterloo economist Anindya Sen told the San Jose Mercury News. And relations with its southern neighbor will also put a damper on the party: U.S. border officials can bar from entry Canadians who admit to having used marijuana or whom might be traveling on marijuana-related business.

Still, international businesses and investment funds have been hovering around the market for years, waiting for the time when they could legally invest in large-scale industrializing marijuana cultivation and distribution. Several medical marijuana producers are already on Canadian stock markets.

Elsewhere in the world, Georgian and South African high courts issued rulings earlier this year that legalized personal use of marijuana without legalizing sales. At least a dozen other countries have informal policies limiting enforcement of marijuana laws without providing for a legal infrastructure for its production and sale.